Lou Barnes

Contributor

After five years as Marketing Manager of a mountaineering clothing and equipment manufacturer and retailer (a great way to enjoy your 20s), Lou Barnes built 45-broker, two-office Spruce Real Estate in Colorado from 1978-83, spending most of his time guiding the firm through extremely high interest rates. The world of money was more fun for him than real estate, and Barnes sold Spruce and joined investment banking ranks for five years as Managing Partner of RCM Government Securities, a broker-dealer working on the early flow of mortgages to Wall Street and their related derivatives. Two of those years involved work on the heart of the savings and loan meltdown -- one of the "consultants" commuting to Texas, Arkansas and other Southwestern garden spots (fortunately, he spoke the language: his family were Okies), he was asked to figure out how deep the hole was going to be. He wrote one of the earliest accurate estimates of the ultimate cost in 1986, and was one of the first to address the necessary asset workouts. Some people thrive in a career on airplanes, and Barnes was not one of them. In 1988 the homebody began another career as a mortgage banker in Boulder, just in time to catch the terrible peak of foreclosures afflicting the greater "Oil Patch" and "Savings and Loan Belt." The firm, Boulder West, survived and thrived as a small mortgage bank -- very old-fashioned, strictly "A" paper, and based on long-term relationships with Realtors and past clients. Even with that strength, Boulder West closed in 2009, and Lou and many of his colleagues joined far-larger Premier Mortgage Group. As a marketing tool and for sanity, Lou has written a weekly column on the financial markets every Friday for 20 years.

How can the world recover from this economic slump?

Why lower rates? Chalk it up to the unending saga: the whole world slowing

May 9

Is there something wrong when youth must rely on family cash to buy?

BOMAD isn't open for business everywhere

May 5

When can we expect the next Fed rate hike?

Although the U.S. can withstand more quarter-point nibbling by the Fed, the outside world cannot

Apr 29

What hot micro-markets tell us about housing in the U.S.

When a small market is on fire, it has consequences for state and national data

Apr 29

Of the surviving 5 Presidential candidates, who'd do the least harm to housing?

Something a Koch brother said provides a clue

Apr 26

Financial markets rattled, but maintaining appearance of calm

The Federal Reserve will meet this week, but it's unlikely to raise rates

Apr 25

When wise guys try to grab your Fannie

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's stockholders were back in court this week

Apr 20

Hiking rates far more dangerous than staying put

Inside and near the Fed, the discussion is about 'asymmetric' risk

Apr 18

Of course they are too big to fail!

It’s absolutely nuts to insist, “no taxpayer bailouts!”

Apr 14

Banks don't cheat people; people cheat people

Goldman Sachs’ $5 billion and Wells Fargo’s $1.2 billion settlements of mortgage wrongdoing would be grounds for giggling if it were not all so painful. Goldman has — at last — this week settled with the Department of Justice for securitizing bad loans from 2005-2007, and Wells for lousy underwriting of FHA loans from 2001-2008.

Apr 13

Has U.S. housing recovery slipped?

Several reliable sources indicate that we could be in for trouble -- but are they right?

Apr 12

Long-term rates fell last week -- the cause? Trouble overseas

The IMF (International Monetary Fund) is also an attending physician and today very much out of character, issuing warning after warning

Apr 11

The 2 rules of prime mortgage rates

Help clients leverage investments while protecting them, too

Apr 5

Expect 2 quarter-point rate hikes in 2016, and another 1% in '17 -- if that

Inflation will rise slowly to the Fed's target, 2 percent.

Apr 4

Why 2 housing economy 'babies' are being thrown out with the bathwater

Asset-backed securities and loan servicing contracts aren't liquid

Mar 29

How fast will interest rates rise, and what will happen to housing?

Productivity is the way we raise our standard of living, and increased productivity is the result of increased savings and investment -- we don’t have either of those

Mar 28

Is there really a starter home price gap?

Recent research has several flaws that fooled mainstream news sites

Mar 25

Why did the interest rate forecast for 2016 change?

And what does that mean for interest rates, mortgage rates and real estate?

Mar 21

After several years of working against each other, global central banks are cornered

The Federal Reserve has clearly chosen external stability over inflation risk here.

Mar 18

2 rules for learning how to read real estate markets

The numbers to learn and data sources to curate